


Work Song

by lesbiankavinsky



Series: Hozier + Ronan/Eve [1]
Category: Raven Cycle - Maggie Stiefvater
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, F/F, also i messed around with the timeline n stuff, basically this is compliant neither to my lady trc canon nor maggie's, but canon events have clearly not all actually happened, lady trc but not in the lady trc verse, this is theoretically the summer after canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-03
Updated: 2016-06-03
Packaged: 2018-07-11 22:46:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7073590
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lesbiankavinsky/pseuds/lesbiankavinsky
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eve tilts her head and a strand of her auburn hair falls across her nose before she tucks it behind her ear. “I can imagine you happy here,” Eve says, and it makes Ronan consider how rarely her friends have seen her contented. Gansey more than the others, but even for her it’s been a long time. Eve turns to her with a grin. “In your kingdom.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Work Song

**Author's Note:**

> Hozier has a very wlw pynch feel to it imo and I'm having some Big Gay Feelings about it. I'm not putting a timeline on how and when I'll complete this project but there will be more "tracks" coming soon

           Eve fits so perfectly into the landscape of the Barns that Ronan can’t quite believe she hasn’t been there all along. She walks in the late afternoon, running the freckled tops of her hands over the tips of the tall grass, heavy with seed, the sun golden on her golden hair. Lovely to the point of absurdity, Ronan thinks, like Demeter bringing in the spring.

“You’re really going to run the farm?”

Ronan nods. “Not alone, obviously. But yeah, it’ll be mine.” Just saying the words still fills her with a burst of joy. All those years of high school she’d thought she had no idea what she wanted to do with her life, but as soon as the Barns was hers it had seemed obvious. Of course she wants to run the farm. It’s the only thing she wants. Well, Eve too, but she’s still holding out to figure out if that happiness will be allowed her.

Eve tilts her head and a strand of her auburn hair falls across her nose before she tucks it behind her ear. “I can imagine you happy here,” Eve says, and it makes Ronan consider how rarely her friends have seen her contented. Gansey more than the others, but even for her it’s been a long time. Eve turns to her with a grin. “In your kingdom.”

Ronan laughs, surprised that Eve remembers her phrase. “God knows it’s good to be back.” It’s an absurd understatement, but Ronan has never been able to speak eloquently about this home away from which she doesn’t know how to exist. 

They walk together past the barn nearest to the house and Ronan glances over her shoulder to where Gansey and Blue and Leah are sitting on the porch with their glasses of lemonade. Ronan leads Eve around the barn, out of view of the others and points out the far field, overgrown with grass and weeds.

“There used to be tomatoes and zucchini and peas and things there. After my mother – we just let it run wild. It’s too late to plant this summer, and I have too much work to do around the house and everything. But next spring we’ll plant again. And there will be animals again.”

“Sounds like a lot of work.”

Ronan shrugs. It is, but it’s the kind of work she was born to, the kind that filled her childhood. It’s difficult but simple and so she applies herself to it readily and thoroughly.

As though she’s read Ronan’s mind, Eve says, “Gansey never got that about you, that you’re not lazy.”

“Do you think she gets it now?”

“Oh, who knows.”

Eve isn’t meeting her eye, and Ronan wonders if she’s inadvertently struck a tender nerve. She never realizes until it’s too late. “I’ll write you postcards when you’re at college. Tell you all the shit Gansey doesn’t care about, the new tools I’m getting to fix the place up. You’re a mechanic, you’ll know what I’m talking about.” Ronan can hear her words falling flat even as she speaks them, but she can’t for the life of her figure out what she’s done wrong. Eve was the one who had led her away from the porch, but now she seems oddly uncomfortable alone with Ronan.

For a while they stand in silence and then Eve, plucking a blade of grass and running it between callused thumb and forefinger, says, “We have to talk about what we haven’t been talking about.”

Ronan’s brain is turning uselessly, trying to work out what she’s missed. Eve’s tone with its slight quaver is so at odds with the golden aura of the afternoon that her words don’t quite seem real. When Eve looks up, Ronan expects her to look upset or cautious, but she only seems nervous, and maybe a little hopeful. Nothing makes any more sense.

“You’ve been watching me,” Eve says.

Ronan stuffs her hands in her pockets. There’s not really anything to say that. It’s true and she’s not about to lie and say it isn’t, but she isn’t sure yet if it’s an accusation or just a statement.

Eve’s tongue flicks out to touch her lower lip before she says, “It’s okay, you know.” Her voice is sweet and slow and _Henrietta_ and Ronan can’t for the life of her understand why she would leave this place. Why she would leave Ronan. “You’re allowed.”

The warmth of the sun is settling into Ronan’s skin. She doesn’t understand what’s happening, what Eve means. Eve’s voice is more sound than meaning to Ronan, but it’s difficult in this place and under this blue sky to be too troubled by that fact. All the same, the ground seems to shift a little under her when Eve reaches out and puts a hand to Ronan’s jaw, her skin warm and dusty as summer, and it shifts a little more when Eve leans forward to kiss her.

It’s a little like waking up after sleeping out in the field on a July day, her head warm and light and hazy, unsure whether she is dreaming or awake. Then again it’s a little like going 90 down an empty highway in the middle of the night. The taste of lemonade on Eve’s mouth goes to her head like communion wine, which has a way of making her dizzy in spite of the fact that it takes most of a bottle of whiskey to get her drunk. Ronan’s hands settle, light and venerating, on Eve’s hips and Eve’s arms come up around Ronan’s neck, her thumb tracing circles at the top of her spine. When Eve settles back onto her heels, Ronan stays perfectly still, eyes closed and lips parted. She thinks, no matter what happens next, this moment will remain with her always. She will think of this kiss as she turns the soil this summer and as she fertilizes it in the fall, when she works in the house through the winter months and when she goes out to plant in the spring. She will think of this kiss as she crouches under the burning sun of summer, pulling weeds and tending to the plants and the animals. When sweat drips down her aching back and she finds herself out of strength, she will think of this kiss and be renewed.

“Ronan?”

She opens her eyes and looks down at Eve. She wants to get down on one knee and ask Eve to marry her, or pledge loyalty to her, or else go and erect a temple to her in the woods, but none of these options seem appropriate so she did the next best thing and said, “ _Hunc, oro, sine me furere ante furorem._ ” It’s wildly out of context, but it feels right somehow.

Eve laughs softly. “Good to know it’s still you in there. You went so quiet.”

“Was that the talk we had to have?”

“Wasn’t much talking, in the end.”

“All for the best,” Ronan says, though the world is still tilting around her. “I’m not very good with words.” And it’s true, because she has no idea how to express how much she’s reeling, even if it’s in a good way.

But again, Eve understands what she’s thinking even without words. “If it helps, this wasn’t sudden for me. Or it was sudden, but it’s not new. Loving you, I mean.”

The word sears in Ronan’s chest and, needing to move to keep from losing her mind, she lifts Eve’s hands in her own, running her thumb along Eve’s knuckles.

“It’s been a while now. I think I knew the first time I saw you here.”

Ronan feels as though she should say something but her mouth is dry and her throat tight so she just listens to Eve and tries to hold herself steady.

“I felt like I was seeing you for the first time. Demons and all.”

As silence stretches between them and Ronan still has no words, she drops Eve’s hands to take her face in both hands to kiss her forehead. When she moves away, Eve gives a little laugh and reaches up to touch her thumb to the corner of Ronan’s eye.

“You’re crying,” she says.

“Oh, fuck,” Ronan says, and moves away to rub her eyes. “God.”

Still laughing, Eve reaches out to take her hand. “Come on, we should go back to the house. The others will come looking for us.”

She begins to walk, but Ronan still stands, clinging to the tips of Eve’s fingers. Eve turns back to her, tilting her head in a silent question.

“What are we going to do?” Ronan asks.

“What do you mean.”

“You’re going to college. You hate Henrietta. All you’ve ever wanted to do is get out of here.”

Eve comes back to stand in front of Ronan. “I won’t be so far away for college. You can come see me.”

“And after?”

Eve looks around her, squinting a little against the sun. “You know, when I said I wanted to leave, I’d never seen this place. It looks to me like a place made for coming home.”

“You’d come back here?”

“If you’d let me.”

Eve’s politeness is so absurd and endearing that Ronan pulls her in to kiss her again, even though they’re in sight of the house now and the others might be watching them. She doesn’t care a bit. Kissing Eve Parrish in these familiar fields, on her own native soil, she’s never felt more at home in her entire life.   
  



End file.
